Bracketology Breakdown
Last Four In: Central Arkansas, Montana State, Southeastern Louisiana, Elon
First Five Out: Jacksonville State, Lamar, Northern Iowa, Eastern Kentucky, Wofford
Anyone reading this last week knows that doing early season FCS Bracketology is like doing a root canal with youtube training and an olive fork. There are so many games against FBS programs, where even the top ranked FCS teams lose, it’s hard to find a good balance between blowout losses and near misses. As it stands, the FCS had 40 games this week against FBS opponents and only Central Arkansas could pull the trick. With that, they get a boost from just outside the top 25 and into the field. By quick glance, six of last week’s top ten suffered losses to FBS opponents. This adds to the peril of early season bracket making.
There were a couple of rather shocking top ten upsets this week. Jacksonville State was blitzed by Southeastern Louisiana on Thursday night. More or less, we have a straight swap there. Wofford was walloped by South Carolina State, sending them careening off the tree. So the Southland is the big winner after Week 1, picking up two bids; one from each of the Ohio Valley and the Southern.
Big Sky (5): *Eastern Washington, Weber State, UC-Davis, Montana, Montana State
Big South (1): *Kennesaw State
Colonial (4): *James Madison, Towson, Maine, Elon
Missouri Valley (4): *North Dakota State, South Dakota State, Illinois State, Indiana State
Northeast (1): *Duquesne
Ohio Valley (1): *Southeast Missouri State
Patriot (1): *Colgate
Pioneer (1): *San Diego
Southern (2): *Chattanooga, Furman
Southland (4): *Nicholls, Sam Houston State, Central Arkansas, Southeastern Louisiana
* denotes projected conference automatic qualifier
